Patent Infringement Lawsuit Filings in the News

January 9, 2013 - Steelhead Licensing LLC, a company that owns a patent related to 3G and 4G technology, filed a patent suit against 13 companies that either manufacture mobile phones or provide wireless service. Besides AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Research in Motion (RIM), the other defendants named in the lawsuit are MetroPCS, Motorola, HTC, Kyocera, LG Electronics, Sony, ZTE, NEC Casio Mobile, Sprint Nextel, Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile USA.

Steelhead has accused the defendants of infringing its 3G and 4G patent on technology for switching cells in a mobile network. The lawsuit was filed in a U.S. District Court in Delaware.

Trial Date Set in Patent Infringement Lawsuit Between SmartMetric and Visa and MasterCard

January 9, 2013 - SmartMetric Inc., a company that developed biometric ATM and banking cards for use in protecting the carrier against identity theft, sued Visa and MasterCard for allegedly infringing its patent. A federal court has now scheduled a jury trial in the case for September of this year.

According to SmartMetric, Visa and MasterCard have begun issuing EMV cards. EMV, which stands for "Europay, MasterCard and Visa," is a global standard for integrated circuit (IC) cards used at POS terminals and ATMs to authenticate transactions.

The patent at suit is U.S. Patent No. 6,792,464.

Vringo Files Second Patent Suit Against ZTE

December 5, 2012 - Vringo Inc. filed another lawsuit in the UK against ZTE Corp., claiming that three more patents are infringed.

"The three patents in suit are just part of our telecom portfolio, and further enforcement actions may follow in due course. ZTE has no license under the patents in our portfolio," said a Vringo spokesperson.

Alcatel-Lucent claims that Apple and LG have been given a chance to license the patents and have not done so; Apple and LG both claim to have paid for their use of the technology on a "pay-as-you-go" basis and that Alcatel-Lucent is trying to include new technology in their patent coverage.

Ericsson Sues Samsung for Patent Infringement

November 27, 2012 - After Ericsson and Samsung failed to renew a patent license after two years of negotiations, Ericsson finally sued Samsung. Samsung claims that Ericsson's claims are "excessive" and Ericsson claims that Samsung refuses to license the patents on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms.

Samsung has licensed the patents-at-suit twice in the past.

Novatel Wireless Sues ZTE for Infringement of MiFi Wireless Patent

October 23, 2012 - Novatel Wireless, Inc., which invented the MiFi Intelligent Mobile Hotspot, sued Chinese company ZTE Corp. and ZTE (USA) Inc. for infringing a Novatel patent related to the MiFi technology. This lawsuit is the second patent suit Novatel has filed against ZTE related to mobile hotspot technology.

"Novatel Wireless is the inventor of the MiFi Intelligent Mobile Hotspot and we continue to lead the product category with a focus on innovation, best-in-class user experience, superior performance and advanced security,” said Peter Leparulo, Chairman and CEO of Novatel Wireless, in a press release. “We are committed to protecting our innovations and our intellectual property from those who take our proprietary technology."

Taiwan University Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against Apple over Siri

July 31, 2012 - The National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan sued Apple for patent infringement, claiming that the iPhone's Siri speech recognition feature infringes two of its U.S. patents on speech-to-text technology.

National Cheng Kung filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas because "it processes faster and its rulings are usually in favor of patent owners and the compensations are usually higher," according to National Cheng Kung's legal manager Yama Chen.

The university is also considering similar lawsuits against Google and Microsoft.

Nokia Accuses Google of Patent Infringement by Nexus 7

July 3, 2012 - Days after Apple's winning two injunctions against Samsung Android devices, Google was hit with another patent dispute: Nokia claims that the Nexus 7 tablet infringes some of its patents.

Nokia has yet to file a lawsuit, so it is unclear which patents are in question.

“Nokia has more than 40 licensees, mainly for its standards essential patent portfolio, including most of the mobile device manufacturers,” a Nokia spokesperson said to Wired. “Neither Google nor Asus [the manufacturer of the Nexus 7] is licensed under our patent portfolio. Companies who are not yet licensed under our standard essential patents should simply approach us and sign up for a license.”

Research in Motion Hit with new Patent Infringement Lawsuit

June 2, 2012 - Mobile Telecommunications Technologies, a Texas-based company, sued Research in Motion (RIM) for patent infringement. The patent owner claims that the BlackBerry's email software and equipment infringes five patents, and is seeking an injunction and damages.

In the court documents it filed, Mobile Telecommunications Technologies says it has "suffered, and will continue to suffer, irreparable injury as a result of RIM's infringement."

British Telecom Sues Google for Patent Infringement

December 19, 2011 - British Telecommunications, better known as British Telecom or simply BT, recently became the fifth large publicly-traded company to sue Google Inc. for patent infringement related to Android. (The other four are Apple, Oracle, Microsoft and eBay.)

BT claims that Google's Android operating system and various Google services infringe six of BT's patents. BT's filing also suggests that the lawsuit is the end result of previous negotiations in which Google refused to pay. BT is thus seeking triple damages for willful infringement as well as an injunction.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.

Groupon Sued for Patent Infringement

November 8, 2011 - A company called Hothand sued the popular daily-deal website Groupon for infringing a patent on a "subscription-based system for providing commerce information for one or more mobile devices for one or more merchants".

Hothand claims that Groupon's iPhone and iPad apps infringe the patent, as do its apps for Android, Windows and BlackBerry devices.

Hothand also filed a similar suit against Yelp, a review site, and previously filed suit against Foursquare. In the Foursquare suit, settlement negotiations over the summer failed and the suit is ongoing.

Keurig Brews Up a Patent Infringement Lawsuit over Knock-off "K-cups"

November 3, 2011 - Keurig, the company known for its single-serve coffeemakers, filed a patent infringement lawsuit against the Rogers Family Co. alleging that the latter's OneCup product infringes two Keurig patents.

Keurig claims that Rogers is violating the two patents by selling single-serving containers, called OneCup and sold under the company's San Francisco Bay brand, that work with Keurig machines and are much less expensive than K-cups. Furthermore, the plaintiff alleges that Rogers is liable for the acts of patent infringement committed by end users who brew up the Rogers coffee in Keurig coffeemakers.

This lawsuit follows a trademark infringement suit filed last month in which Keurig and Wolfgang Puck were sued over their "Jamaica Me Crazy" coffee. Flavor Dynamics, a New Jersey-based coffee company, says the Keurig product infringes its trademark on "Jamaican Me Crazy" coffee.

Flavor Dynamics seeks $1 million in damages alone, and claims its reputation has been damaged by dissatisfied coffee drinkers who posted videos on YouTube giving their product bad reviews when the product they really mean to bash is the Keurig/Puck coffee.

Oracle Sued for Infringement of Visual Voicemail Patents

November 1, 2011 - Last week Klausner Technologies, Inc. announced that it had filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Oracle Corporation. The patents-at-suit cover Visual Voicemail, which allows users of mobile phones or computers to visually identify and selectively listen to voicemail messages.

Lodsys Lawsuit Drives App Developers Out of US Market; New Patent Lawsuit Filed

July 18, 2011 - A story in the Guardian reported that many app developers are withdrawing their products from the US versions of the Apple App Store and Google's Android Market because they fear being sued by companies such as Lodsys, which earlier this year launched a lawsuit against several developers of iPhone apps.

And in another blow for the app developer industry, a company from India - Kootol Software - announced that it has sent a notice of infringement to several companies, including Microsoft, Apple, Yahoo, Google, IBM, Research in Motion, LinkedIn, MySpace, Research in Motion and a number of other companies. Iconfactory, one of the app developers sued by Lodsys, is also in Kootol's sights.

In an unusual twist, however, Kootol doesn't claim infringement of an existing patent but of a patent application: U.S. patent application 11/995,343, "A Method and System for Communication, Advertising, Searching, Sharing and Dynamically Providing a Journal Feed." Kootol says it has also applied for patents in India, Canada and Europe.

ITC Judge Rules that Nvidia Infringed Three Rambus Patents

January 27, 2010 - It's been a good month for Rambus. Following the company's settlement with Samsung, A U.S. International Trade Commission judge has now ruled in Rambus' favor against Nvidia.

Cnet News reported on January 22 that the ITC judge found that Nvidia infringed three Rambus patents, but cleared Nvidia of infringement of two other patents, which were examined and found to be invalid. The patents in suit relate to memory controllers.

David Shannon, Nvidia's executive vice president and general counsel, expressed confidence that the remaining Rambus patents would be found invalid in re-examination proceedings in the Patent and Trademark Office.

"We will now take the patents before the full commission for a final decision on whether any of these patents are valid, enforceable, and infringed," said Shannon.

January 21, 2010 - Multimedia Patent Trust, of which Alcatel-Lucent SA is a 99 percent beneficiary, has sued Walt Disney Co., Fox and NBC Universal Inc. for infringing its patents on video compression technology in DVD and Blu-Ray discs sold by the media companies.

The suit was filed in federal court in San Diego, Calif.

Apple Files Trade Complaint with ITC Against Nokia

January 18, 2010 - Previously in the smartphone war between Nokia and Apple, Nokia had filed a complaint in December with the International Trade Commission (ITC) which sought to ban the importation of Apple's iPhone, iPod and MacBook products.

Skyline's patent, which issued in June 2009, relates to a way of sending 3D images over the Internet.

Microsoft's Bing is designed to compete with the very popular Google Maps, as Microsoft attempts to become more competitive in the search engine field. And Google itself has had a brush with Skyline over a different patent, though a federal judge in Boston ruled that there was no infringement.

Skyline makes terrain-visualization software that shows land masses in 3D on computers and handheld devices. Mostly used by government agencies, the software was used in the Sichuan province of China after the May 2008 earthquake to help with the relief effort.

Now Nokia has asked a federal court to ban the importation of almost all Apple hardware into the United States: iPhone, iPod and Mac products.

Nokia claims that Apple is infringing seven of its patents related to user interface, camera, antenna and power management technologies.

Apple has not taken the litigation lying down. On December 12, Apple filed a lawsuit of its own against Nokia, alleging infringement of 13 of its patents.

Apple Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit Over Knockoff AC Adaptors

November 25, 2009 - Apple, no stranger to patent lawsuits, is on the plaintiff side of the case this time. Apple has sued a company called Media Solutions Holdings for infringing the company's patent on power adaptors for Apple laptops, such as the MacBook.

The Media Solutions adaptors are alleged to infringe an Apple patent called "Power Adaptor."

Google Hit with New Patent Infringement Lawsuit Filed by Israeli Company

November 2, 2009 - Red Bend, a company based in Israel, has filed suit against Google in the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Red Bend alleges that Google's Chrome browser, specifically the Courgette method Google uses for shrinking updates to reduce bandwidth requirements, infringes its patents on a compression algorithm.

As Chrome and the Courgette update system are both open source, the lawsuit also accuses Google of publishing and distributing the source code for the technology.

Apple has shipped over 34 million iPhones to date, so the company could end up paying Nokia anywhere from $200 million to $1 billion in a settlement, according to some analysts in the IT / smartphone business.

October 21, 2009 - A Texas-based company called U.S. Ethernet Innovations has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against several computer manufacturers, alleging infringement of a patent entitled "Network Interface with Host Independent Buffer Management." The patent is No. 5,299,313 and was issued in 1994 to 3Com.

The link between 3Com and the complainant wasn't immediately clear, but it appears that the company had purchased the patents from 3Com.

October 11, 2009 - It was announced last week that Eolas Technologies, a technology research firm, had filed suit against several major companies, including Adobe Systems, Apple, Google, eBay, Amazon.com and more.

Eolas claims the defendants are infringing two of their patents: one for allowing embedded applications in Web browsers, and the second a continuation of the first and relating to the use of plug-ins and AJAX (asynchronous JavaScript and XML).

The patent survived a lawsuit against Microsoft that lasted for years and ended in a settlement for an undisclosed amount.

August 27, 2009 - TiVo sued AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. this week for patent infringement. The patents in suit relate to DVR technology, specifically the ability to pause and rewind live TV.

TiVo filed suit in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas, and is seeking damages for past infringement as well as a permanent injunction.

August 11, 2009 - Pharmaceutical company BTG PLC filed a patent infringement complaint with the US International Trade Commission (ITC) in late July, seeking to block US imports of several electronics products that it claims infringe its patents related to increasing the storage on Flash memory chips.

Though BTG is focused solely on pharmaceuticals, the company was founded after World War II as a state-funded corporation which commercialized research from British universities.

Some of the companies named in the complaint were Dell, Apple and Research in Motion (maker of the Blackberry), all of which use Samsung's Nand memory chips.

The patent infringement lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the district of Delaware.

Vizio Scores Win in Patent Infringement Lawsuit against Funai

June 22, 2009 - As reported on our Patent Infringement Litigation News page earlier this month, Vizio, Inc. had filed suit against rival Funai Electric Company, Inc. for infringement of patents related to high definition flat panel televisions. Funai sells HDTVs in the US under the brands of Emerson, Sylvania and Philips.

Vizio has now scored a win in its patent infringement lawsuit against Funai, as the International Trade Commission granted a temporary hold on a federal ban that would have prevented Vizio from importing certain HDTVs into the US based on the fact that they contain chips that were found to infringe on a Funai patent.

In addition, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office recently re-examined Funai’s patent and concluded that its claims are invalid.

The ban would not have had much effect on Vizio anyway, however. “The products involved with this particular claim are obsolete and no longer in mass production,” the company said in a statement. The win is more significant in light of Vizio's ongoing antitrust litigation and the litigation over Funai's infringement of Vizio's patent.

Funai has also filed a patent infringement lawsuit against LG Electronics Inc., on June 5.

June 9, 2009 - j2, which provides Internet-based fax and other telecom services, has filed a patent infringement lawsuit in California Central District Court against its competitor OneSuite, claiming infringement of j2's patent related to sending and receiving messages using the Internet and/or telephone systems. OneSuite provides prepaid long distance, plus fax and other telecom services.

j2 has filed similar patent infringement lawsuits against Protus, Venali, and other firms.

June 1, 2009 - Late last month, VIZIO, Inc. filed a patent infringement suit against Funai Electric Company, Ltd. for alleged infringement of numerous VIZIO patents through its activities of manufacturing, importing and distributing high definition flat panel televisions in the United States.

VIZIO is seeking an injunction prohibiting Funai from importing and selling high definition televisions in the US, according to VIZIO's press release, and is also seeking an award of damages for millions of past infringing sales.

Apple, AT&T, Napster and Others Hit by Patent Infringement Lawsuit

May 18, 2009 - Tune Hunter, a company which owns a patent titled Music identification system, filed suit last week against a host of companies for infringement of its patent. The patent-in-suit describes "a method for marking the time and the name of the radio station in portable device such as a key holder, watch, cellular phone, beeper or the like which will allow the user to learn via internet [sic] or regular telephone the name of the song, artist and/or music company by matching the stored data with broadcast archive."

Tune Hunter alleges that its patent is infringed by applications such as Shazam, which lets users hold a phone up to a radio or some other audio source in order to identify a song. The Shazam application is available for the Apple iPhone and several other smartphones as well.

Other companies targeted by the Tune Hunter lawsuit include Samsung, Napster, Motorola, Gracenote, LG, Pantech and Cellco Partnership, the last under its Verizon Wireless brand. (Amazon.com, Napster, and Gracenote are retail partners of Shazam.)

May 15, 2009 - Gilead Sciences Inc. has filed a second patent infringement lawsuit in U.S. District Court in New York against Teva Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. alleging infringement of two patents related to emtricitabine, a component of Gilead's anti-HIV drugs Atripla and Truvada.

Gilead first hit Teva with a lawsuit in December 2008, when Teva sought approval to manufacture a generic form of Truveda. Teva maintains that Gilead's two emtricitabine patents are invalid, unenforceable and/or will not be infringed by Teva’s manufacture, use or sale of its generic product.

The new lawsuit is in response to an attempt by Teva Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. to gain approval to manufacture and market a generic version of Atripla before the expiration of both of Gilead's emtricitabine patents.

May 6, 2009 - Princeton University has sued Barr Laboratories for patent infringement over the blockbuster cancer drug Alimta, which is used to fight a form of lung cancer related to asbestos exposure. Alimta is based on a chemical compound developed by former Princeton chemistry professor Edward C. Taylor, and Princeton owns a patent on the compound.

Eli Lilly and Company, a co-plaintiff with Princeton in the complaint, sells the drug under license from the university. Earlier, in June 2008, Lilly and Princeton filed suit against two other generic-drug manufacturers, Teva Parenteral Medicines Inc. and APP Pharmaceuticals. (Teva’s parent company bought Barr in December.)

December 31, 2008 — General Patent Corporation (GPC), a leading patent licensing and enforcement firm, announced today that it filed a patent infringement lawsuit against NCSoft Corp. of Austin, TX on behalf of its client, Worlds.com, Inc. (Worlds).

The lawsuit (Case 6:08-cv-00508) was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Tyler Division.

Worlds.com, Inc. (OTC BB: WDDD), of Brookline, MA, owns US Patent No.7,181,690 titled “System and Method for Enabling Users to Interact in a Virtual Space” (the ‘690 Patent). The Patent relates to computer architecture for a three-dimensional graphical multi-user interactive virtual world system. Such systems are utilized in Massive Multi-Player Online Games (MMORPG) of the type known as Graphical Multi-Dimension (GMUD) games, which provide a graphical representation of the player’s character (avatar) wherein movement of the character in virtual space alters what the character views.

General Patent Corporation has represented Worlds.com, Inc. since 2002 as its exclusive licensing agent.